Chapter 14: Ryan’s Ask
When Eli was six, Ryan asked, through Sara, whether the medical-consent clause could be revisited.
I sat with the request for a week. I reread the birth plan. I did not reread the video; I no longer needed the images to remember the sound. I wrote back that the clause stood. He could have opinions, input, presence. He could not have unilateral power over Eli’s body. Sara translated it into polite legal prose. Ryan’s attorney argued. The clause stood.
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Ryan was angry in a text he later apologized for. I accepted the apology as a data point, not a reset. We remained two adults at a school concert, clapping on cue, dividing the recordings, not pretending we had been co-authors of every decision that led here.
Eli waved from the stage. Both of us waved back. The simplicity of that almost undid me. I let it.
